Category: Colorized Image

MRS. ASHER “MOTHERS” OTHERS AND LOVES ALL, c.1916

Mrs. William Asher, the director of the extension department of the business women’s work, seems to me to be just like the mother of the Sunday party—not that she is older than the rest, for she isn’t—but she has an abundance of gray hair which is now almost white and this gives her a very motherly appearance. Then her eyes, too, carry out the idea for they are heavy with pity for all of the suffering and sorrow that she has seen. It just happens that Mrs. Asher is the same age as Mrs. Sunday and everybody knows that that isn’t old. In Mrs. Ashers’ case, as in that of many persons, grief caused her gray hair, for within three months of each other her mother and her sister died.

“Yes, Mr. Asher and I and the Sundays are old friends,” she said in response to a question. “Years ago out in Chicago, which is my native city, we all worked in the same church. Mr. Asher was the assistant pastor, Mrs. Sunday was superintendent of the intermediate department of the Sunday school, and I sang in the choir and taught also. My friendship for Mrs. Sunday was cemented when her mother died. Mrs. Sunday was grief-stricken, of course. I sang at the funeral.”

Mrs. Asher not only sang at the funeral, but did all within her power to make the last days of the mother of Mrs. Sunday as pleasant as they could be.

There is no doubt that all of the members of the Sunday party have had unusual experiences and Mrs. Asher has been no exception. Practically all of her life, Mrs. Asher has been in evangelistic work. When she was a little girl of 11 years old, she was converted in the famous Moody Church in Chicago. Many persons have been converted under interesting circumstances; but few come into the church in an atmosphere such as surrounds the old Moody Church.

Years ago Mrs. Asher met and married William Asher, who was at that time a Pullman conductor on the run between Chicago and New York City. His uncle was a railroad man and had given the young man a start in life, but Mr. Asher soon realized that he was working on the wrong track. Giving up his position, he went to a theological seminary, where he studied and was ordained a minister.

It seems that opportunities in the case of Mr. Asher the opportunity came soon. DeWitt Talmage, the famous minister, needed an assistant and Mr. Asher was selected to fill this place, which he held for several years. Afterward he resigned to take up Bethel work in Duluth, Minn.

Dr. Wilbur Chapman was in Chicago conducting a religious revival one time and the Ashers became interested in his work.

“We were so interested in fact that Dr. Chapman asked and we did,” said Mrs. Asher here. “During the first five years of our connection with him we did saloon work. This was work that had been practically unattempted before. We had a little portable organ and with this we would go into the saloons and sing. We always got the consent of the owner of the saloon first before we went. The owner always understood the conditions upon which we worked. We did not do reform work, but we merely went to sing.”

“Was it very hard?” was suggested.

“Harder than you can imagine. Only those who have attempted it have any adequate idea of what it means,” she replied. Many a time Mr. and Mrs. Asher would be put out and their little organ thrown out of

This was trying work, but they stuck to it for five years, a long time for any person to spend in such a gruelling occupation. At the end of the five years they left the work, not because it was hard, but because larger opportunities for greater and more effective work offered themselves. The new work was arduous, though it did not have the hardships attendant upon it that the saloon work had. On several of Dr. Chapman’s trips around the world the Ashers accompanied him.

But the story of the relations with the Sundays is now the topic of perhaps greater interest. After the death of Mrs. Sunday’s mother, the bond between Mrs. Sunday and Mrs. Asher became closer. They worked together in the little church until Mr. Sunday entered upon his career as a revivalist. In 1911 they came together again and since then they have been engaged in the same work.

Mrs. Asher does splendid work among the women and girls of the factories, shops and mills and the girls grow to love her.

“We try to get the girl to realize her responsibility to herself to lead a Christian life and then to other girls around her. We want her to lead a life that will count for something in the love of those who live and work with her.”

Mr. Asher does a work that is of great value to Mr. Sunday, and of great benefit to the towns that Mr. Sunday cannot cover, and that are longing for a revival. To these towns Mr. Asher goes and conducts religious services. Just at present he is at work in Phelps, New York, although he is spending today in Trenton.

The Times (Trenton, New Jersey) · Sun, Jan 16, 1916 · Page 6 Downloaded on Mar 10, 2026

Miss Miller was once preacher on prairies, c.1916

In the world of business, men who go along with poor methods, lack of punctuality, slovenliness and all kinds of slipshod ways are regarded as “out of it,” but that idea is not so prevalent in the religious world, possibly because so many religious world workers unconsciously use these methods.

Miss Frances Miller, the director of business women’s work in the central district, uses no slipshod methods. One could scarcely meet a more hustling person in religious work than Miss Miller, excepting, of course, “Billy” himself. Some think that long association with his work has moulded Miss Miller’s naturally active temperament into the form that it now has.

Miss Miller is the youngest and oldest member of the Sunday party. Youngest in the point of years, but oldest in the length of time that she has been a member of the party. For 11 years she has been doing the work for business women that she is doing today and in that time she has become an authority in her line.

Born in the great northwest, where people just naturally have a swing and vim which those in the East don’t seem to have, she grew up in this atmosphere, and has developed all of the hustling qualities of a true Westerner.

From the standpoint of training Miss Miller is surely equipped to carry on the work which she has in charge. “I studied at the Presbyterian College in Cedar Rapids, and later graduated from the Congregational College in Fargo, North Dakota. From there I went to the Moody Institute, in Chicago,” she recently said.

There’s a kind of open secret about Miss Miller. She is an ordained minister, but she doesn’t always tell it because she thinks that if people knew that they they won’t warm up to the things that she wants them to, because they are afraid that she will preach to them. Don’t worry, Miss Miller’s preaching is something to listen to. It is her own individual brand, with a little of “Billy’s” thrown in.

After completing her religious education, Miss Miller was sent to the frontier by the Home Missionary Society, where she remained for two years. And those two years on the frontier were no joke. She had two parishes 12 miles apart from each other and each Sunday, in clear or stormy weather, she would drive from one in the morning where she preached to the other, where she would preach in the evenings.

That’s a wild black country out there, and many times she would drive for miles and never see a creature. The hardships, too, in that little circuit of hers were very severe, almost more than she could bear. After finishing two years as a preacher she came home, discouraged and feeling that the religious calling was a pretty hard one.

She hadn’t been home very long, when Dr. R. A. Torrey wanted her to assist in his evangelistic work. She refused, however, feeling that it was too much. Dr. Torrey knew a good thing when he saw though, and was not to be put off, and one day he wired to her: “Come tomorrow. I have you on the program for tomorrow morning,” and she went.

Just about 11 years ago she joined the Sunday party and has been helping business women and girls ever since. In this she has been very successful, due to the fact that she has a real message to give to the women and girls, and because of her splendid personality.

Miss Miller has a hobby. She love’s horses and almost every day in Syracuse one could see her out for her morning’s canter. Since she has been in Trenton she has not been riding, although she hopes for a gallop or two before she goes from here to Baltimore, the place of the next campaign.

The Times (Trenton, New Jersey) · Sun, Jan 16, 1916 · Page 6 Downloaded on Mar 10, 2026

MISS SAXE FAMOUS AS BIBLE TEACHER, c.1916

MISS SAXE FAMOUS AS BIBLE TEACHER

Miss Grace Saxe, court stenographer, religious press reporter for Colonel Roosevelt, writer of religious text books, Bible teacher, tourist and general favorite wherever she goes, is the Bible teacher and leader of the prayer meetings of the Sunday campaign.

One has only to talk with Miss Grace Saxe just a few minutes to feel altogether assured that she has had many interesting experiences and has gotten every possible advantage from them. She is known in many countries in Europe and is considered by many persons to be the finest Bible teacher in the world at the present time. That is no idle compliment and the people of Trenton are now having an opportunity to hear this famous woman. She has not always been in Bible work, however, for several years ago she was leading a sternuous life as court reporter in St. Louis.

About this time her interest in Bible study and Bible teaching was aroused and she went to the Moody Institute to study. The famous revivalists, Dr. R. A. Torrey and Charles Alexander, were then stirring the country with their services and Miss Saxe became interested in their work. At the close of their evangelistic work in this country she went abroad with them and assisted them for two years.

Knowing that she could tell many fascinating stories about her travels and her work, the writer asked her about them one day and had a delightful chat discussing her adventures.

“I was with Dr. Torrey and Mr. Alexander for two years,” said Miss Saxe, “in England, Ireland, Scotland, Paris and Germany. I did not teach in Germany and only taught English speaking people in Paris.”

After completing her work with the evangelists she returned to London and for two years contributed to the London Christian, the oldest religious publication in the world, a series of articles on Bible study in the Old Testament. The Old Testament by the way is of engrossing interest to Miss Saxe, and once a Jewish girl came to interview her. It happened that the girl was well versed in the Old Testament and they discussed it to the exclusion of the usual interview.

But to revert to her work. At the invitation of a friend Miss Saxe went to Egypt intending to remain only a short time traveling. Her fame as a Bible teacher had already spread far even then and the missionaries hearing that she was in Egypt prevailed upon her to hold a series of Bible classes in Cairo, Alexandria, and other missionary stations. This she did, teaching the natives by means of an interpreter.

The missionaries in Palestine had also learned of what she was doing in Egypt and requested her to come to them and undertake the same work. She accepted the invitation and taught in Palestine for two months.

“When I finished my teaching, my friend and I took a driving trip north from Jerusalem to the Sea of Galilee and to Damascus and returned by the way of Baalbeck where we stopped wherever we chose and stayed as long as we cared to. Many of the famous places mentioned in the Bible we visited and during our stay there we would read everything that the Bible said about the place.”

It may be as a result of this trip that Miss Saxe can talk so fascinatingly about the places of the Old Testament.

After rambling about Palestine in this way she and her friend returned to Egypt for a summer conference.

“It is very hot in Egypt in the summer,” she said, “and almost all the missionaries go to the coast which costs them no more than to stay in the interior. They offered to stay in the interior the summer that I was in Egypt if I would conduct a Bible class. We had, of course, no adequate place in which to hold such a course and my friend sent to London for an immense tent. This arrived and was erected and for six weeks I gave four courses of Bible study. We held not only a Bible class but really a religious revival. I talked to many natives who would come to the tent, by means of my interpreter.”

At this time Colonel Roosevelt was expected to come out of the jungle and was scheduled to make several addresses in various mission stations. The religious press of America cabled to Egypt for the missionaries to get a stenographer to take down the Colonel’s talks. Stenographers do not abound in Egypt, however, and the task was easier said than done. The missionaries knew of my work as a reporter and cabled back to know if I would go, and the message came back to go ahead. So off I started and went up the Nile farther than I would have gone if I had not been going to meet the Colonel. I arrived several days before he did. Finally he came out of the jungle and I reported all of his addresses for the religious press.”

Miss Saxe then returned to this country and about four years ago became connected with the Sunday party, and has been the director of the prayer meetings and the Bible classes ever since. It is under her management that the plan for the block prayer meetings has been worked out and at the end of each campaign she organizes as many of these groups as desire to be organized into permanent Bible classes.

She is a woman of gracious personality and becomes extremely well liked wherever she goes. She is above medium height with black hair and dark eyes. Her smile is very cordial and her manner most delightful.

Of course, no story of Miss Saxe is complete without a mention of her fondness for cats. Many persons have a pet of some kind and a kitten is Miss Saxe’s favorite of all animals. There are days, of course, when she does not see her pet at all and when he is entrusted to the mercies of some one else. The little feline leads a happy life in spite of that and is doubtless proud of being the pet of so illustrious a person.

In Trenton, this animal is “John,” a gray and white kitten, named in honor of three of the Times Staff members.

The Times (Trenton, New Jersey) · Sun, Jan 16, 1916 · Page 6 Downloaded on Mar 10, 2026

https://www.newspapers.com/image/1194099094/The Times (Trenton, New Jersey) · Sun, Jan 16, 1916 · Page 6 Downloaded on Mar 10, 2026

On Billy preaching . . . c.1906

A person who witnessed Billy preaching at Princeton, Illinois, said this of the Evangelist’s preaching:

“When it comes to preaching Billy is a storm, a whirlwind, a cyclone, hurricane, a tornado, a-well, everything indicative of power. He preaches like his life depended upon it. He preaches like he had it to do.” Adding, “As long as Rev. William A. Sunday stays on track and labors to call men back to the old path – the gospel path – he should be allowed to work without opposition from Christian people, even if his methods are sensational and unique and his language at times is shocking.”

Bureau County Tribune (Princeton, Illinois) · Fri, Mar 9, 1906 · Page 3.

When Springfield Stood Still: Billy Sunday’s 1909 Earthquake

Springfield, Illinois
February 26 – April 11, 1909

In the spring of 1909, something happened in Springfield that people would talk about for decades.

Not a political convention.
Not a legislative battle.
A revival.

For forty-five days, the capital city of Illinois — population 51,678 — was overtaken by a wooden tabernacle, a former professional baseball player turned evangelist, and what many believed was a visitation of God.

By the time it ended, nearly 5,000 people had walked the sawdust trail.

And Springfield would never quite be the same.

The Numbers — and the Scale

The statistics alone are staggering.

  • 4,729 reported conversions
  • 774 converts on the final day alone — the largest single-day total of Sunday’s career to that point
  • 607,000 total attendance over the course of the campaign
  • 35,000+ at the final Sunday service
  • $20,218 in total contributions
    • $10,734 to Sunday
    • $9,483 to campaign expenses

To put this in perspective: Springfield’s population was just over 51,000. Attendance over the campaign equaled more than twelve times the city’s population.

One hundred thousand people attended special weekday meetings.
35,800 participated in cottage prayer meetings.

This was not a tent revival on the fringe of town.

This was the town.

Even Governor Charles Deneen and members of his family were reported among the converts on the closing day, joining First Methodist Episcopal Church . When the governor walks the aisle, you know something seismic is happening.

And yet, remarkably, Billy Sunday himself was reportedly disappointed with the conversion numbers. He believed “personal work was not begun early enough.”

That was Sunday. Five thousand souls, and he still thought the church could have done more.

The Night Billy Was Horsewhipped

The campaign did not begin quietly.

On opening night, in front of 8,000 people, Sunday was assaulted.

A man named Sherman Potts rushed forward with a buggy whip and struck Sunday multiple times. The audience teetered toward panic. Women wept. Children screamed. Sunday leapt from the platform and knocked his assailant down. They rolled in the aisle before ushers and police subdued the attacker.

The papers reported that Potts had previously been declared insane and had been confined at Jacksonville. He claimed he acted in defense of women’s virtue, alleging that Sunday had criticized them.

What could have ended the revival instead amplified it.

Fred Fischer directed the choir to sing, calming the crowd. The meeting continued.

Springfield had just witnessed the kind of drama that headlines love — and revivals sometimes ride.

The “Judgment” Sermon and the Men

On one Sunday afternoon, 8,000 men packed the tabernacle to hear Sunday preach what was described as his “judgment” sermon.

Three hundred men responded.

Sunday’s masculine appeal — direct, confrontational, athletic — was reshaping revival culture. This was not sentimental religion. It was muscular, public, civic.

He preached like a ballplayer sliding into home — coat off, body leaning, words cutting.

And men came.

Mother’s Day: 9,000 White Handkerchiefs

One of the most remarkable moments came on Mother’s Day.

Sunday requested that every person wear a white flower or ribbon in honor of mother. If your mother was alive, do her an act of kindness. Write her. Telegraph her. Give her a gift. If she was gone, do something kind for someone else’s mother.

He invited businessmen to close their stores from 2–4 p.m. and pledged that an offering would go to the Woman’s Club for distribution to city charities.

Then it happened.

Nine thousand white handkerchiefs rose in the air in honor of mothers.

In an era before official federal recognition of Mother’s Day, Springfield became a tableau of white cloth and public gratitude.

It was revival fused with civic virtue. Sunday understood symbolism.

Inclusion: Deaf Mutes and Interpreted Sermons

Another remarkable feature of the campaign was the regular attendance of a large group of deaf men from Jacksonville.

Professor Frank Reed, Jr., of the State School interpreted Sunday’s sermons. Reports indicate that between thirty and forty deaf attendees were converted during the Springfield meetings .

When the offering was taken, the deaf men gave ten dollars — a meaningful sum in 1909. Sunday seized the moment: If men who could not hear a word of what I say were contributing to this extent, what ought some of you fellows down there do who hear it all?

That’s classic Sunday — sharp, public, convicting.

The Ushers, the Machinery, the Organization

Photographs from the campaign show massive ranks of ushers — disciplined, suited, organized.

Springfield was not spontaneous chaos. It was structured revival.

This was the era when Sunday’s campaigns became logistical marvels:

  • Massive wooden tabernacle
  • Coordinated prayer meetings
  • Choirs
  • Personal workers
  • Cottage gatherings
  • Financial accountability

The revival was both spiritual movement and operational achievement.

Sunday was not merely a preacher. He was building a machine.

“A Good and Great Man”

After the campaign, C. C. Sinclair, pastor of Stewart Street Christian Church, offered this assessment:

“A good and great man, mighty in word and in deed; a prophet, and more than a prophet… The church has been purged and strengthened, and Springfield is being turned to God. It is such a revival of religion as comes to a community but once in a generation.”

That language is not casual.

Once in a generation.

Springfield’s churches reported strengthening and purging — language that suggests repentance within the church as much as conversion outside it.

Revival, for Sunday, was not merely altar calls. It was institutional recalibration.

Why Springfield Mattered

Springfield 1909 was a hinge moment.

  • It proved Sunday could sustain massive attendance over weeks.
  • It demonstrated his appeal to political and civic leadership.
  • It showed that controversy could fuel momentum.
  • It fused patriotic symbolism, moral reform, and evangelical urgency.
  • It revealed a revival model scalable to larger cities.
1909 postcard of Springfield, Illinois. Color-corrected. Author’s collection.

In many ways, Springfield was the rehearsal for the metropolitan campaigns to come.

And for a city of 51,000 to generate 607,000 in cumulative attendance? That’s not ordinary religious enthusiasm.

That’s a cultural event.

The Artifact That Survived

I own a 60-page souvenir booklet titled Rev. W. A. Sunday Meetings at Springfield, Illinois (c. 1909). When it arrived in November 2025, the bottom left corner throughout the entire booklet had been ripped away and was missing from the package .

It’s fragile. Imperfect. Scarred.

But so is revival history.

What Springfield experienced in 1909 was messy, dramatic, organized, emotional, public, controversial, generous, patriotic, and deeply evangelical.

It was America before the Great War.

It was Protestant civic religion at full throttle.

It was Billy Sunday in ascent.

And for forty-five days, Springfield stood still —
while thousands walked forward.

When Billy Sunday prays

Billy Sunday prays with a punch.

He prays as though God Almighty were standing right before him.

He prays for everybody.

He prays with the same earnestness and energy that marks his preaching. He prays with the zeal and vim that starred him in baseball.

He expects his prayers to land.

He prays for you and me, for the plumber and the telephone girl, for the banker and the street cleaner, for the washwoman and the debutante.

There’s nothing perfunctory in Sunday’s praying.

Sunday’s prayer is not what he says many a prayer is—“Just a funny noise.”
Sunday has something to ask for and he asks for it.

He prays for the salvation of souls, for the success of his meetings, for men to “hit the trail for Jesus Christ.”

Billy Sunday at prayer is the picture of a lawyer pleading to a court. Sunday is the attorney at the bar. Those he prays for are his clients. God Almighty is the supreme judge. God is on the bench hearing the argument.

Sunday states his case. He tells the “judge” what he wants; he gives his reasons; he makes his argument; he pleads:

“For Christ’s sake, God, grant what I ask.”

There’s punch in Sunday’s praying.
His prayers distinguish him.

Cited from: The Omaha Daily News. September 19, 1915: 10.

Sermon: Secret of failure (Jer. 5:25), c.1915

Another popular sermon for Billy Sunday during the 1915-1916 campaigns was the Secret of Failure.

In “Secret of Failure,” Billy Sunday argues that failure in life is not accidental but rooted in disobedience to known truth. Using Jeremiah 5:5, he contends that God’s blessings are available, but people forfeit them by breaking His laws. The central issue is not ignorance but willful rebellion—people know what is right yet refuse to do it. Sunday emphasizes that sin is often subtle and socially acceptable, not just gross immorality, and that even church members can live in quiet compromise. He warns that partial obedience, moral neglect, and conformity to the world lead to spiritual defeat. External religion—church attendance, respectability, or profession of faith—cannot substitute for genuine obedience and transformation. True success, he insists, comes from aligning one’s life with God’s revealed will. The sermon builds toward a direct appeal: stop excusing sin, confess it honestly, and live out what you already know to be true, or failure—spiritual and moral—is inevitable.

Quotes from the sermon

“Your failure isn’t because you don’t know better—it’s because you won’t do better.”

“God tells you what to do, and you nod your head—but you never move your feet.”

“Some men are too good to be counted among the wicked—and too bad to be counted among the saved.”

“A half-obedient man is a whole failure.”

“You can sit in church and hear the truth every week—and still go to hell with a Bible in your lap.”

Curated from September 24, 1915 Omaha Daily Bee.

Secret of failure-Omaha_Daily_Bee_1915_09_24_2

“BILLY” SUNDAY ASSAULTED.


Page 2 of The Britt News, published in Britt, Iowa on Thursday, March 4th, 1909
Horsewhipped by Religious Zealot at Springfield.

Rev W. A. Sunday, better known as “Billy” Sunday, a former baseball player, who is now an evangelist, was horsewhipped Friday night by a religious fanatic at the Sunday tabernacle in Springfield, Ill., where, in the presence of 8,000 persons he was conducting the opening meeting of a religious revival.

The evangelist had just made his opening remarks and was leaning against the pulpit while a hymn was sung by Fischer and Butler, his choral leaders, when a powerful man who says his name is Sherman Potts ran forward with a buggy whip and struck Sunday several terrific blows.

Sunday leaped from the platform and dashed at his assailant, whom he knocked down. The audience was on the verge of a panic, with women weeping and children screaming while Potts and Sunday rolled and tumbled in the aisle.

Mr Fischer directed the choir and the audience to sing, and in a few moments the entire audience was calmed Several men seized Potts and held him until policemen came and took him to jail.

Mr Sunday suffered several painful bruises from the whip The prisoner said his home was near Lexington, Ill According to his statements at the jail he was once declared insane and committed to the Jacksonville asylum, whence after a brief confinement he was released.

He made the attack he said, in defense of the virtue of women which he declared had been criticized by the evangelist The police say that Potts is a religious fanatic.

  • Page 2 of The Britt News, published in Britt, Iowa on Thursday, March 4th, 1909.